The story so far......

I replaced the old 500 mini pot with a regular 500 from stew mac and it works but the tone of the guitar seems different (There weren’t any caps fitted to the old vol. pot).

Any one know if there is a difference in tone between the mini 500 pots and the regular 500 ones ?

The last person to own the guitar replaced many other bits (like the pu switch) which, although it all still works, lights up PUs in a strange order (my fault). I could spend a day figuring out which connection goes were but Id rather be playing so I think Im gona get a new one that I under stand and switch out the old one (sorry bad pun)!

I may have (also) switched the polarity of the middle pu (I'm on doggie ground here) when I hooked it up to the PU switch as there is still some hum in unexpected places (i.e. when I use the bridge and middle / neck and middle PUs together)

So, having shielded the scratch plate and the body cavity with copper foil (needed 1.5 shielding kits for an HSS strat body), replaced the volume pot (may try a 1 meg ohm, I’ll see if MF do them, cheers IH) I still have some work to do !

Im very pleased that I haven’t exploded any bits (including my self) however I think that after one more attempt I will have it sorted (dratted newfangled pickup switch !!!)

If any one has any handy hints Id love to hear them
Cheers
S